DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.71385 Provisional chapter Chapter 7 Solubility of Chitin: Solvents, Solution Behaviors and SolubilityTheir Related of Chitin: Mechanisms Solvents, Solution Behaviors and Their Related Mechanisms Jagadish C. Roy, Fabien Salaün, Stéphane Giraud, JagadishAda Ferri, C. Guoqiang Roy, Fabien Chen Salaün, and Jinping Stéphane Guan Giraud, AdaAdditional Ferri, information Guoqiang is available Chen at and the end Jinping of the chapter Guan Additional information is available at the end of the chapter http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.71385 Abstract Chitin is a natural polysaccharides having a unique molecular arrangement of 2-(acetylamino)-2-deoxy-d-glucose, it possesses multifunctional properties and is suitable for various applications mainly in pharmaceutical, biomedical food, textiles and pack- aging fields. Therefore, being considered as a superior material for a sustainable future of industrial development, chitin perfectly meets up the demands with diversified func- tionalities in applications, excellent biocompatibility and biodegradability. Non-toxicity to human and environment (air, water and soil) is a great opportunity for this revolutionary, innovative and sustainable material. Moreover, antibacterial potency and low immuno- genicity of chitin have broadened the aspects of research and development on structure- function relationship toward biological tissues and activities. Despite abundance, low cost and availability, many experimental data from potential studies, reproducibility problems of chitin solubility measurement still limit the development of products and access to the market in large volume. Batch-to-batch variability, non-precise characterization and ran- domly distributed acetyl groups of chitin structure eventually results in a bad reproduc- ibility of chitin solubility. Therefore, the chapter aims to organize the information of chitin structure at molecular level and correlate solubility with chitin structure. Moreover, the dissolution mechanism and solution behaviors in different solvents will be discussed in this chapter. Keywords: polysaccharide, chitin, chitosan, solubility, dissolution, hydrolysis 1. Introduction Chitin is a polysaccharide consisting of glycosidic bonds in linear or branched fashion between two adjacent monosaccharides, 2-(acetylamino)-2-deoxy-d-glucose. In general, monosaccharides © 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution© 2017 The License Author(s). (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed which under permits the terms unrestricted of the Creative use, distribution, Commons andAttribution reproduction License in any (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), medium, provided the original work is properly which cited. permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. 110 Solubility of Polysaccharides undergo a polycondensation reaction to link more than 20 units of oligosaccharides by glycosidic linkages. Most polysaccharides show the degree of average polymerization (number average DP) around 200–3000 while longer polysaccharide (like cellulose) exhibits DP around 7000–15,000. The presence of acetyl, amino and hydroxyl groups in the polysaccharide chain, due to the generation of hydrogen bonds (inter and intramolecular) makes the chitin highly aggregated. Therefore, it is insoluble in all regular solvents such as water, organic solvents, mild acidic or basic solution, etc. Chitin insolubility affects the scaling up of the processes for the production of chitin-based prod- ucts. The first study on solubility determination of chitin was done by Austin who tested chitin in different solvents 1[ ]. It was a well-organized evaluation of chitin solubility in different types of solvents such as dichloroacetic (DCA) and trichoroacetic (TCA) acids in presence or absence of alcohol, etc. Later on, many studies were conducted with the same intention by many other scien- tists and chitin solubility was verified in many solvents such as dimethylacetamide (DMA)/LiCl mixture [2], CaBr2·H2O saturated methanol [3], hexafluoroisopropyl alcohol and hexafluoraceton [4], lithium thiocyanate [5], phosphoric acid [6] and N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone [7], etc. Although dissolution of chitin is possible by these solvents many of them are toxic, scarcely degradable, corrosive, or mutagenic. Therefore, the choice of an appropriate solvent for chitin and chitosan solubilization is important and primary issue for lab scale research and scaling up for industrial practices. The acetyl groups in chitin can be removed by deacetylation to convert insoluble chitin into a more soluble compound, namely chitosan (this name is given to chitin with at least 50% degree of deacetylation, DD). Therefore, this chapter will deal with the deacetylation process and the changes in molecular orientations and bonds after the deacetylation reaction. Moreover, the chapter will revise technical details regarding different aspects of solution behavior of chitin and chitosan. The parameters influencing solubility and their action mechanisms, theoretical discus- sions and recent relevant research findings on chitin and chitosan will be found in this chapter. Finally, modification of polysaccharides and their enhanced solubility will be discussed. 2. Molecular structure of chitin and chitosan Polysaccharides mimic protein and amino acids structure consisting of special conformation of secondary, tertiary and quaternary architectural structures. Chitin is arranged as crystalline microfibrils clustered with six-stranded helixes of a protein structure. Polymerization of the monosaccharides, β-(1-4)-2-acetamido-2-deoxy-β-d-glucosamine units exhibit three different polymorphism (α, β and γ sheets) whereas the N-acetyl glycosyl moiety is a common crystal- lographic unit in all [2]. Electron diffraction studies reveal a highly crystalline nature of chitin in the α and β conformation. The α-conformation is one of the most abundant allomorphs in which the unit polymer chains are arranged in an antiparallel fashion whereas the adjacent chains are always in the opposite direction [3]. In β, less frequent in nature sheet all chains are in the same direction and parallel, γ conformation is a variant of the α arrangement in which two parallel, adjacent and unidirectional chains are arranged with one opposite directional chain (Figure 1). Both α and β conformations maintain a strong network dominated by intra- chain hydrogen bonds between the groups of C═O⋯NH and C═O⋯OH within a distance of 0.47 nm. In α-chitin conformation, additional inter-chain hydrogen bonds bind the hydroxy- methyl groups while this type of interaction is not observed in the β conformation. Thus, Solubility of Chitin: Solvents, Solution Behaviors and Their Related Mechanisms 111 http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.71385 Figure 1. Structure of different chitin conformations (α, β and γ-chitin domain conformation). β-chitin conformation is more prone to intra-crystalline swelling than α-chitin conformation. Different structural arrangement of α-chitin and β-chitin provide the reason why water, alco- hol and amines are able to get access to the β conformation by swelling with and without disrupting the chain arrangement and crystalline structure [4]. For example, the swelling of β sheets in concentrated acidic solution of HNO3 or HCl solution exhibits a permanent transfor- mation into α-chitin conformation. In this case, a partial dissolution occurs driven by hydro- lysis induced by the acid treatment. The recrystallization process of the smaller hydrolyzed chain starts on the un-hydrolyzed chitin sheets, which are called “epitaxy”. Therefore, no single crystal growth is observed during the recrystallization and new α-chitin conformation crystals are observed. The transformation β→α indicates that the α-chitin sheet is thermody- namically stable and stability is achieved only via recrystallization [3]. The α-chitin sheets are not swelled by water and alcohol while aliphatic diamine or highly basic solutions can diffuse into the crystalline structure to promote the formation of chain complexes. The parameter value of inter-chain expansion is same as β-sheet around 0.7 nm. Therefore, a simple process- ing of β-chitin with 20% NaOH results into the conversion of α to β-conformations. Chitin polysaccharides contain functional amino groups in its backbone to provide posi- tively charged polysaccharide upon solubilization. The amount of reactive amino groups can be increased by increasing deacetylation which is quantified by the degree of deacety- lation (%DD). Chitin is the only positively charged polysaccharide among all other naturally occurred biopolymers which allows a wide range of biological applications. There are two main groups in the chitin structure influences the functionality of chitin: (i) amino groups and (ii) hydroxyl groups (Figure 1). The amino sites might react with aldehyde and ketone groups for the Schiff Bases formation and influence solubility. In addition, two hydroxyl groups in chitin structure provide excellent pathways for modification and functionalization in view of 112 Solubility of Polysaccharides an increase of solubility. Those hydroxyl groups involve in the O-acetylation, O-alkylation, H-bonds formation, etc. [5]. Also, the amino groups are responsible for the short-range pri- mary and secondary electrostatic interaction while the